CHEMICAL REACTION

“911 What is your emergency?” The stoic female voice crackled from a cellphone speaker.

With trembling hands, thirty-nine-year-old Megan Lowry’s finger fought to lower the sound on her Android. She had dialed 911 after clearing her head, trying to absorb her current situation. Holding the phone close to her mouth she whispered in high pitched staccato breaths. “Hello? You have to help me! I’ve been car jacked!”

Lit solely by her phone, Megan lay balled up in the dark confines of the trunk of a car, her own car. A bag of groceries she had just purchased were spilled open behind her. She could feel the moisture on her back from crushed eggs. Several bottles of

Vitamin Water rolled whenever her car made a sharp turn. A tire iron beneath pressed into her hip. The smell of exhaust lent a weight to the hot air she took in with every panicked breath. Megan fought an urge to cry. She whispered again into the phone. “Please, you have to help me.”

A robotic voice replied. “Try to remain calm. What’s your name?”

“Megan. Megan Lowry. I’m locked in the trunk of my own car.”

The voice registered a slightly more human tone. “Megan, I’m Sheila, I’m here to help you. You say you’ve been abducted, yes?”

“Yes. Yes. I stopped for groceries. I was putting them in my trunk when someone attacked me from behind. I was struck on the head. I woke a minute ago in the trunk of my own car!” With her free arm she felt for the walnut sized bump on the backside of her skull. She rubbed it, too scared to feel the pain.

“Can you speak up, Megan. I’m having trouble hearing you.”

Megan dared not to. “I can’t. I don’t think he knows I have my phone. I don’t want him to hear me.”

“Okay, okay. I understand. Tell me what kind of car you have, Megan.”

“A Toyota Camry. 2001, White. Please help me.”

“White Camry. Toyota. Got it.”

Desperation clung to each whisper. “Can you send the police? Can you track my phone?”

“That’s what we're working on Megan.”

“Hurry, please!” Her voice breathless now.

“I need you to focus, can you do that, Megan?”

“I can try.” Her whisper squeaked.

“Do you know your license plate number?”

“Yes. KEMY5T3. California plates”

“K-E-M-Y-5-T-3, is that right, Megan?”

“Yes. It’s…” Megan stopped as the car came to a halt. Perhaps her abductor heard her, Megan couldn’t be sure. “Sssshhh! Be quiet. We’ve stopped.”

Megan heard bells begin to ring in a back-and-forth cadence. The rhythm was familiar to her. The next sound confirmed what she suspected. The sound of rumbling thunder caused the whole vehicle to vibrate. She couldn’t see it. She heard the rolling freight

train lumbering through a railroad crossing. Megan knew of tracks on the far side of Glendale that ran North and South. She now believed she was heading East out of Glendale towards Pasadena so she couldn’t have been unconscious long. It took a solid three minutes for the clackety-clack of the train to pass and the warning bells to fall silent. She guessed the barrier lifted when she felt the car jolt forward and the tire iron dig into her hip as she bounced while the car crossed over the tracks.

From the trunk, Megan felt her car bank, taking on an incline and gaining speed. She was certain they were on a freeway entrance ramp curving to enter a stream of California traffic heading for God only knows where.

She whispered again. “Sheila, we’re getting on the freeway. I can feel it.”

“I’m here, Megan. The highway patrol’s been notified. We already have an Amber Alert out.”

“An Amber Alert?” Megan’s unease pinched her stomach. A thousand panicked thoughts filled her head. “He can read those signs too. Won’t he wonder how it was reported so fast? What if he figures out I have a phone? There’ll be no way for you to find me.”

Sheila attempted to reassure her. “We’re using our Enhanced 911 system. We’re already triangulating your location through the cell tower your phone is using. We should have your approximate location momentarily.”

Megan hissed. “Approximate? I need you to find my exact location now!”

Sheila returned to a professional tone. “Megan, focus. You’ve got to keep your wits about you.”

Megan snapped back. “I’m sorry, Sheila. I don’t get car jacked every day; you know?”

No answer came back. “Sheila?” Worried her tone offended the operator, Megan shook her phone, frantic to get a response. “Sheila?” Again, no answer. She felt the car slowing down. She heard horns honking outside the car. The blaring sounds seemed to echo and bounce back upon themselves; then muffled, as if they were in a tunnel.

Megan whispered a single word. “Bridge.” It was the only answer she could think of why she lost her connection. There were no tunnels she knew of near Pasadena. There were a number of bridges crisscrossing the freeway. Megan could tell the traffic must

be moving at a crawl under a bridge, or a series of bridges.

The point was moot. Her phone had no signal. Megan felt a pang of abandonment, a loneliness not dissimilar to the one she felt about the divorce she was currently going through, but given her present situation, much worse. She was beginning to think maybe whispering wasn’t the best strategy. Megan thought maybe to start

yelling or screaming. Perhaps someone in the slow-moving traffic would hear her. She could kick the trunk hatch to attract attention.

Before a decision could be made, Megan heard the sound of a siren in the distance growing louder and getting closer. For the briefest of moments, she wondered it were the police coming to her rescue. Maybe they triangulated her location. Maybe they set up a roadblock to slow traffic. Maybe the Amber Alert worked after all.

The many maybes were answered when the siren blared past her and drowned out like a dying cat just ahead. The smell of gas fumes, oil and radiator steam entered her confined space. From outside, Megan could hear the electronic garble of emergency radio calls. She visualized an ambulance arriving at a terrible car accident on the freeway. They must be passing the scene and the looky-loos brought traffic to a crawl. She wanted to scream. Fear held her frozen in place. Megan felt the fractional G-force as the car accelerated and traffic resumed its normal flow. Megan whispered. “Sheila?”

Silence hung in the air. The bars were empty. She couldn’t connect with a tower. Megan held the phone in two hands, her thumbs went to work. She decided to send a text. But to who? Megan scrolled through her recent contacts. There was her boss at ChemGen, Mike Rafferty, useless for the most part. Then her current boyfriend, Nelson Wickland, patent attorney she met at a ChemGen conference; Nelson was arranging the legal papers for a new chemical compound the pharmaceutical would be releasing revolutionizing cancer treatment. She met Nelson over a month ago. She had been sleeping with him several times already. He was the first man she shared a bed with after her separation from her ex. She wasn’t in love, but she was lonely. She needed the feel of a man to hold. Nelson was, intelligent, successful and a gentleman. Then she saw Jake Lowry’s number, her soon to be ex. Megan would never have left Jake had she not found evidence of him cheating. Receipts from hotels, motels, romantic restaurants, a cabin in Big Bear, sexual texts on his phone. She was deeply hurt and divorce at the time seemed her best option. She exhaled, then text what might be her final message.

It was to Jake. She figured a fifteen-year-old marriage must have meant something. Megan remembered the instant chemistry they had when they first met at Stanford. Her text explained her current situation clearly as possible, ending that if she survived this encounter, they might give it another try.

Two bars blinked on and off on the phone like the pulse of an emergency room patient crashing. Megan hit send. The message buffered trying to connect with a faint signal. The wait seemed endless. Then the bars went solid. The text stopped buffering. It got sent and the phone vibrated. Caller ID read, 911. Megan answered in a whisper. “Sheila?”

“No, Megan this is Officer Lancer with the Barstow Highway Patrol. Sheila connected us when your signal returned. We have a good idea where you’re located. Are you injured?”

She whispered. “Other than the bump, I’m not injured, but the road we’re on now is bumpy as hell.” She stopped. The car began to slow, gravel could be heard crunching beneath the wheels then went silent at full stop. Megan's heart raced. "We stopped!"

The engine shut down with a sputtering cough. She heard the driver’s door open with a popping creak and felt the car jostle as the driver climbed out. The door closed with a thud she that she could feel in her chest. She rolled on her side, shoved the phone in her pocket and faced the trunk latch.

The phone was her lifeline. She would protect it until the end. A key jostled outside. A click. The trunk sprung open. A flashlight beamed in her face. She tried to glimpse the car jacker’s face. Her kidnapper lowered the light.

It was Nelson Wickland, the man she had been sleeping with for the past two months. “You? Nelson, what the fuck are you doing?” She started to climb out, a raised revolver stopped her forward motion.

“Your phone, Megan. Give me your phone.”

Her phone? No way. Her phone was Sheila. Her phone was Highway Patrol. Her phone was GPS, her only way to be located. “What phone? I don’t have a phone.” She tried to look incredulous. “What I have is this nasty bump on my head, thank you. Why are you doing this?”

“You’ll find out soon enough. Now give it.”

Megan shrugged holding out empty hands.

Nelson’s voice went grim. “Don’t make me hit you again. Phone.” He pocketed the light. Both were now bathed only in the red of the taillights.

“Nelson, I swear…” She couldn’t give up so easily.

Nelson chuckled. “Megan, you just text Jake. I can’t believe you suggested a reconciliation.” Nelson held up his phone, it showed her text.

“Jake? How...?” She stopped her question mid-sentence. Megan was a Stanford University graduate. It took less than a second for her to compute the scenario; Jake and Nelson are conspiring to kill her, but why? Fifty percent of community property? They’re both successful men. It made no sense. Then it hit her. The patent. Megan’s contract was written where she owned a percentage of any of ChemGen’s products she helped create. If the divorce went through before the patent was signed, Jake got nothing.

“Jake will be along. We’ll meet at our rendezvous tonight. A cabin in Big Bear. Now give me your phone before I beat it out of you...” He raised the gun again. “…Or something worse.” He held out a hand. “The phone.”

Megan hoped Sheila or the Highway Patrol cop was catching all of this. This was the final string of hope left on a tenuous safety rope. The man she married for fifteen years and the man she recently began sleeping with have plotted to murder her. The biggest shock was understanding the two men must have been lovers for some time. Which is why she never found whoever the "other woman” was.

Megan looked at the desert expanse where the car was presently parked. It was as fitting a place as any to match the hurt flooding over her and drowning her sense of self. She noticed the bars on the phone were blank. The battery near dead, the signal once again dropped. She had no idea if anyone heard anything. She held the phone out with great reluctance.

Nelson snapped it from her hand, shut it off, dropped it, crushing it beneath one of his twelve-hundred-dollar Oxfords.

That was it, he might as well as stepped on her heart. All her lifelines were cut. Megan was truly alone. She cowered elbow up, as Nelson slammed the trunk shut leaving her in choking darkness. She felt Nelson climb back into the driver’s seat. The engine hesitated to turn over then a wisp of carbon monoxide leaked through the trunk floor. The car began to move. Megan felt every bump on the desert road leading back to the highway.

From the interior front cab Led Zeppelin’s Dazed and Confused began to play loud. Megan guessed Nelson found her CDs in the driver’s console and was playing her 70’s song list. The percussion from the speakers throttled against the back seat making Megan feel each beat of bass like a small gut punch. Her favorite band now sounded like a death march dirge.

Music has the capability of dredging up memories from the mind’s deepest recesses. In the darkness, Megan’s thoughts drifted from her claustrophobic fear turning to early days with her father. He was the reason that rock ’n roll was as much a part of her DNA as her hazel eyes.

Professor Connor O’Conner, a science teacher at Stanford University, single father to a precocious, outgoing young Megan O'Conner, raised her to be independent, curious and an audiophile of 70’s music. If Classic Rock were the only category on Jeopardy, Megan would have been grand champion.

He also fueled her love of science, the direction her career took. He taught her simple experiments like how to make invisible ink from lemon juice, create a fireworks-like show in a glass filled with olive oil, water, and food coloring. Megan was not like most of the neighborhood girls her age who experimented with make-up, lipstick, and eye shadow.

She was eight when she got her first chemistry set. Nine when she almost set the house on fire mixing potassium permanganate crystals, glycerin, and water. Despite that, her father never scolded her. He just asked her to think. Always think.

He’d playfully tease her saying most little girls were made of sugar and spice and everything nice, but she was different. She had her own special chemical make-up, equal parts Boron, Radium, Iodine, Nitrogen and Sulfur. At that age she knew he must be joking. The elements that made up humans were simple, Oxygen, Carbon, Hydrogen, Nitrogen, Calcium, Phosphorous, Potassium and Sodium. It wasn’t until she noticed the symbols on the periodic table that she understood her father’s joke.

(B), (Ra), (I), (N), (S). Brains.

Long ago he taught her to always rely on intellect. It’s why she became a chemist and a damn good one.

Megan snapped out of her reverie returning to her present dilemma. Zeppelin was still playing loud from the front cab. She got to work. She felt underneath for the tire iron wedged beneath her, taking the flat end, used it as leverage to pry open the rear taillight panel, timing it on each musical downbeat. She popped the panel, pulling the light from its mount. Stretching the wires, she brought the bulb into the tight compartment illuminating it like a Halloween haunt.

The music track up front changed. Golden Earring’s Radar Love thudded through the rear seat. It was to this rhythm that the car seemed to accelerate, and Megan got busier.

She reached for the grocery bag contents and began to forage. Picking up item after item, some she’d keep, others, toss in a corner. She found what she needed. 8 ounces of

olive oil, a shaker of Extreme Hot Cayenne Powder, a lemon, a bottle of Windex, black pepper. Megan found a funnel near an oil can where she stored the vehicle’s emergency equipment. She grabbed two road flares. She was ready to build her final defense.

Megan used the flat end of the tire iron to tear through a road flare. She grabbed the funnel, shoving it into the bottle of vitamin water. Into it she poured the contents of the flare. The Potassium Nitrate, Polymeric Resin and Strontium Nitrate would dissolve in water, while filtering Potassium Percolate into a crystal. She

needed something to sift out the crystals, but what?

Megan removed her bra as if she were Houdini escaping from a strait jacket. Using one of the brassiere’s cups, she poured the contents from the bottle, straining the liquid in a corner leaving only the Potassium Percolate crystals behind which now needed to dry.

She did this by utilizing the bra’s other cup allowing it to absorb any liquid. She reopened the Windex bottle, added the crystals making sure nothing touched her skin. Megan had just fashioned her own bottle of MACE. With the crystals the potency of this homemade pepper spray was multiplied threefold.

The music stopped. Nelson called out from the driver’s seat mockingly. “Honey, we’re home!” It was time to ready herself. The trunk ’s smelled like a meth lab crossed with a Chipotle restaurant. Megan hoped the fumes hadn’t seeped into the forward compartment. She knew this would have to be a complete surprise when they opened the trunk. There would be no testing of the spray lest she blind herself.

Megan turned her body to face the trunk latch, placing her feet firm against the trunk’s rear panel behind the fender. She lay in the cramped compartment like an astronaut in a capsule awaiting launch. She felt down to her side to make sure the second

flare was in place and within reach, as well as the tire iron. Igniting the flare could turn the flammable pepper spray even more deadly. She pulled the lightbulb from the wire plunging herself back into darkness. Megan gripped the spray bottle with two hands and readied for her defensive assault. She gave one final whisper, “C’mon. Bring it.”

The white Camry, rear right taillight out, sat idle outside a lone cabin. Jake stepped out from inside onto the porch. Nelson climbed out and the two men approached each other hugged, then kissed. Megan couldn't hear what they were saying. They turned their attention to the trunk. Noticing the rear light was out and exchanged glances. Jake inserted the key. Nelson raised his gun. Both stood at the rear ready to open the trunk.

The car's license plate, illuminated by a tiny bulb read, KEMY5T3 or “CHEMISTRY.” The very thing that brought them all together. Now all three awaited the outcome of the coming chemical reaction.